2005-04-20 - 10:31 a.m.
I hate The Giving Tree
Every year Rootbeer gives an a Passover-Easter brunch at her place. We call it Keaster (Kosher Easter). The first year I attended Keaster, we met this well put together woman and I knew I could never be friends with her. Why? Because she likes The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein. Don't jump to conclusions. I love every other poem by Shel Silverstein (and what a great name for a children's poet). All I wanted as a child was to get Light in the Attic and Where the Sidewalk Ends. I have the Hug O' War as a tattoo for God's sake. So yes I love Shel Silverstein. I just hate The Giving Tree. It's Shel Silverstein's Lorax. It's the book of unabashed gloopy sentimentality from a writer with a wickedly evil sense of humor. And moreover, it's the biggest ode to codepeendence I have ever read in my life.
What happens in The Giving Tree? There's this little boy and this big tree. The boy plays climbs the tree and plays in it and he and the three are each others' best friend. As he gets older he asks the tre to give him things. First apples to sell in town and make a living. And then branches to build a house. And then a goddamned trunk to build a canoe. And finally, after giving up its apples, branches, and trunk, the BOY STILL ASKS THE TREE FOR SOMETHING. He whines that he's old and just needs a place to sit so the tree offers up its stump for him to rest his ass on. Every stanza ends with:
And so he did and
Oh, the trees was happy.
Oh, the tree was glad.
What kind of horseshit is that? This boy asks and asks and asks and the Tree gives and gives and gives and the boy doesn't do a goddmaned thing for it. No weeding, no fertilizer, no watering. It's all take, take, take. He could have planted a few apples seeds to grow other trees. He could have taken only the dead branches. But NOOOOO he takes it all. All the apples. All the branches and all the trunk. And he wants more. And the tree was happy and glad. Not fucking likely. The boy was probably telling the tree that it could do no better than to have an immature taker as its buddy. And so the tree didn't know it could probably let its apples fall to the ground and create saplings to support it as it got older. It didn't know that it could just let a dead branch fall on the boy's noggin to keep him from sawing off the branches. But it was probably so beaten down by a boy that paid attention to it only when he needed something that it didn't think it could do better. I bet you there was probably another tree in the woods that wanted to pollinate the Giving Tree's blossoms and they could make saplings together and have a whole orchard, but the stupid, selfish boy took away the tree's branches so no blossoms could form.
And so he did and
Oh, the trees was happy.
Oh, the tree was glad.
Happy and glad my ass.
